Chocola: Boehner Slammed Club for Growth Due to Frustration

Club for Growth President Chris Chocola says House Speaker John Boehner criticized his group for speaking out against the bipartisan budget deal out of frustration.

"I'm not sure what the speaker's point is other than he is frustrated, and frankly I'd be frustrated too if I had his job," Chocola told "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV.

"He couldn't get enough Republicans to do what Republicans say they're for, and that was keep the sequester to make sure we don't bust the spending caps," Chocola said.

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"The House could have passed that easily with no Democrat votes, but they chose not to and they chose to say what Republicans or politicians, regardless of their party, always say: We can't do the hard work now, so trust us to do the hard work later."

Chocola — whose fiscally-conservative, nonprofit group focuses on cutting taxes and other economic issues — said the deal raises the deficit immediately and promotes more spending.

"I'm not sure what Congress has done in our recent memory that should instill that trust in anybody … Republicans are afraid of their own agenda. They're afraid of the things that they believe or they say they believe in."

But Chocola, a former Republican congressman representing Indiana, added that he still likes Boehner, despite the criticism.

"He's a nice guy. He's got a tough job … so I'm not going to beat up on Boehner," he said. "But the problem is the behavior of the Republicans when they're in the majority. They are in the majority in the House. All they had to do was say, we're going to keep the sequester…"

"Are we supposed to believe that we can't spend less today, but we're going to spend less tomorrow? It's a joke. The American people are too smart, they've seen this play before. It ends the same way every time."